Prasar Bharati to offer its infrastructure to telcos, broadcasters

Prasar Bharati plans to offer the infrastructure and services of its Resource Centre to telecom service providers and broadcasters. Broadcasters and telecom companies will be paying a fee to Prasar Bharati for sharing its infrastructure, manpower, technical inputs and consultancy.

Confirming the development, Dr H. O Srivastava, chief engineer of All India Radio and also head of the Resource Centre, declined to reveal revenue targets or pricing plans. However, he said that it is aiming to become a profit centre in the first year of operation itself. Negotiations were already on with some of these companies for sharing of its resources.

The cellular operators could utilise the infrastructure of Doordarshan and AIR, particularly the towers for putting in place their dish antennas. The dish antennas of the telecom companies can be located at a desired height on the tower. These companies will also be able to use the land and buildings of DD and AIR to accommodate their equipment.

Among broadcasters, the centre is in negotiation with private FM radio operators such as Vertex Broadcasting Company Ltd of the Dabur Group, Music Broadcast Private Ltd of the Ispat-Star venture, and Entertainment Network of the Times Group for offering them turn-key solution in the area of FM transmission set-up.

Ispat-Star’s MBPL wants to use the Prasar Bharati infrastructure in Lucknow, and Bennett, Coleman and Company’s Entertainment Network is in talks with the public broadcaster for using its resources in Jabalpur, Pune, Bhubaneswar, Lucknow, Hyderabad and Cuttack.